Black Voices

Issue date: 4/27/09 Section: News

Media Credit: AGYA AGYA founder, Divinity Barkley (center) with program participants.

Media Credit: AGYA Ugandan mother, Gorrety Nakirembe is one of the newest participants of AGYA

The Amagezi Gemaanyi Youth Association(AGYA) is a non-profit founded by a USC alumna that is positively impacting Ugandan girls.

Divinity Barkley (class of 2008), co-founded AGYA in November of last year.

During her senior year at USC, she took a trip to Kenya that sparked her interest in the economic development of Africa.

"It was my first time travelling out of the country and my first time in Africa," Barkley said."I began to see the human face of the suffering that is usually exploited in Africa."

She felt so inspired that she returned to Africa after graduation, hoping to affect change in the troubled continent.

Her answer was AGYA., an organization whose purpose is to educate young girls. She began the program in Uganda, where educating males is prioritized over the education of females.

During her work in Uganda, Barkley discovered parallels between herself and the girls she worked with.

"I saw reflections of myself wherever I went," Barkley said. "The only thing that separated me from these girls was I had an opportunity in America that these girls did not have."

While the average American child knows how to use a computer by age eight, most 16-year-old Ugandans don't know how to browse the internet or send an email.

And in Uganda, 95 percent of women have not received above a ninth grade education.

In January of this year, AGYA opened the doors of its first facility in Uganda. It recently received a donation of eight computers to launch their computer literacy program.

Barkley believes that technology proficiency is essential to helping AGYA participants better compete with their counterparts throughout the world.

Barkley had to overcome many challenges when starting AGYA. Because she is African-American and a female, other nonprofit workers and even some Ugandans doubted her capabilities.

"Being a woman and an outsider culturally has been a challenge," Barkley said. "In the beginning, some Ugandans didn't have confidence in me. They assumed white people were smarter and knew more. They had a sense of inferiority instilled in them by colonialism."

Ugandans slowly embraced Barkley and the AGYA programs have grown, now enrolling approximately 60 young girls in its afterschool program. One of the most rewarding aspects of Barkley's work with AGYA is witnessing the young girls grow.

"When I first came to Uganda, they were shy, timid and afraid to speak up for themselves, but I've seen such of boost of confidence in the past six months," Barkley said. "These young ladies want to be seen as role models to other young girls."

Along with educating young girls in Uganda, the AGYA encourages college students to take service-learning trips to Africa.

"There has been nothing in Africa that has motivated students to go to Africa," Barkley said. "Many students will travel to Europe, but never Africa. We want all students to try to understand how people live and to dispel stereotypes about Africa.

Barkley hopes that if more students travel to Africa, more will experience the transformative breakthrough she had and become interested in the economic development of the continent. These trips could also help to nullify the negative images of Africa as portrayed by the media.

Barkley will be travelling to Uganda next semester with ten students in a trip co-sponsored by USC.

Despite pressure from her parents to obtain a corporate job, Barkley found that her true passion lay in nonprofit work, through which she could employ her talent of helping others.

"This was God's plan for me all along and it has let me know who I am and given me a purpose," said Barkley. "I'm helping people and that's what I've always wanted to do regardless of my career path."

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